Quote Originally Posted by Jimbo View Post
In fact, gorm derives from the old Norse word gaum which means, to the best of my understanding (my old norse is a bit rusty) "thermal underwear". And, as we all know, wandering out into the wilds of Old Norse without your thermal underwear is one of the classic blunders, the most famous of which is "Never get involved in a land war in Asia".

Anyway, over time gaum-less (lacking thermal underwear) turned into gormless, and the meaning drifted from the literal to the figurative - let's face it, wandering around without thermal underwear in Old Norse is a particularly stupid thing to do.



James.
So back to gormless, particularly 'gormless twit'. If a bona-fide twit were to go gormless, could he not be said to be a gormless twit and just a twit as he regained his gorm?

Adversely, if someone went gormless and became a twit as a result, he may well not be a full-time twit as he reverts back to non-twit status as he gets his gorm back.

I cannot say, but I feel you have been too hard on yourself, Jimbo! Another pint is in order!

Bruce